


the nature of sin

by mei_an



Category: Avengers: Endgame - Fandom, Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Endgame!Steve ended as an entitled asshole, M/M, if you liked the ending of Endgame you probably won't like this, people aren't prizes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-02-08 13:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18624499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mei_an/pseuds/mei_an
Summary: Steve Rogers had fought long enough. He deserved to rest, deserved his happy ending. But not like this.It wasn’t just Bucky (and Sam and Wanda and everyone else) that he wronged when he stayed in the past. It was Peggy, too.--"...And that's what your holy men discuss, is it?" [asked Granny Weatherwax.]"Not usually. There is a very interesting debate raging at the moment on the nature of sin, for example." [answered Mightily Oats.]"And what do they think? Against it, are they?""It's not as simple as that. It's not a black and white issue. There are so many shades of gray.""Nope.""Pardon?""There's no grays, only white that's got grubby. I'm surprised you don't know that. And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things. Including yourself. That's what sin is.""It's a lot more complicated than that--""No. It ain't. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they're getting worried that they won't like the truth. People as things, that's where it starts.""Oh, I'm sure there are worse crimes--""But they starts with thinking about people as things..."- Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett.





	the nature of sin

**Author's Note:**

> I’m a lurker, not a writer, but I had to get this out. It’s pretty much just me venting and using Bucky as my mouthpiece to do it. 
> 
> Full Disclosure: I loathe Peggy Carter. I can’t stand the character as given by the MCU (specificity because I’ve never read the comics). The thing is, I don’t have to like her to be offended as fuck by what they did to her. I am also offended by the insistence that Steve deserved to pull this shit and that Bucky would agree that Steve deserved to pull this shit.
> 
> And so: this.

The thing was, Bucky actually hadn’t seen it coming. If anyone would, it’d be him, right? But he hadn’t. He’d honestly thought that Steve would come back.

Until he didn’t.

(Bucky had thought that his days of putting up a mask to hide his churning emotions were behind him. Turned out some things never quite left you completely.)

He’d seen the old man at the bench. He walked away. He didn’t talk to him.

The next day, Bucky didn’t talk to Steve. Or the day after that. It would have been the day after that too, but that was when Steve came to him.

 

* * *

 

“You had no right.”

“Bucky--”

“No. No, you shut up, you fucking _shut the hell up_. You- I can’t even believe you. How could you?”

“I’m sorry, Bucky, I’m so sorry, but I had to. She was right there, I had to--”

“SHE HAD A LIFE! You were the one who told me that, you were the one who said that she went on and had a happy, fulfilling life. One without regrets, one where she wouldn’t change anything that she’d done, that she’d been through. Were you lying? Was she?”

“… No, I didn’t. And I don’t think she was either.”

“Then who the fuck do you think you are to take that away from her. Who the _fuck_ do you think you are that you could have the _right_ to take that away from her!”

“C’mon, Buck, it wasn’t like that! It’s not like I held a gun to her and forced her to be with me! I just… I deserve it, don’t I? After everything I’ve done? My happy ending.”

“Not like this. Not at this price.”

“What price? Bucky, I’m here. A little different, yes, but I came back. I still came home to you.”

“No, you didn’t. I don’t know who the hell you are, but you aren’t Steve Rogers.”

“Bucky!”

“Steve Rogers wouldn’t have just wiped away Peggy’s whole life as though it didn’t matter! As though everything she did, every choice she made, her every thought and opinion was meaningless! Because if it didn’t happen with Steve Rogers, it didn’t count. Because what Steve Rogers wants is the only thing that matters. All she is is your prize, the reward that you’ve earned. Newsflash Rogers! People aren’t prizes! How dare you just take--”

“I didn’t! That wasn’t what happened and- where did this even come from? It’s not like you ever cared for her.”

No, Bucky never had come around to giving a damn about Peggy Carter. It had occurred to him that maybe he was supposed to. That a better person would appreciate someone who could appreciate the man that he loved when no one else had. He wasn’t even sure if he could put it down to old-fashioned jealousy. After the trenches, the labor camp, the laboratory… Sam might have said that Bucky just didn’t have the resources. He wasn’t sure the reasons were relevant. He didn’t have to like a person to be appalled at what was done to them.

“Because I, of all people, would have no idea what it’s like. To have someone else decide that they knew better what my life should be. To have someone else hijack my life and change it to suit them, make it fit what they wanted because what they wanted overrode everything else – my life, my choice, my _goddamn fucking autonomy_. There’s absolutely no reason at all why that should strike a chord with me. Right?”

“It’s not the same thing. What they did you to was horrific, but I didn’t do that to Peg, I didn’t hurt her like that.”

“Just because it wasn’t as obvious as what happened to me, doesn’t mean it didn’t exist. Autonomy: the capacity to make an informed, uncoerced decision. Was she informed, Steve? I don’t think so. Because here I am. I still became the Winter Soldier, still fought you – young you – for Project Insight, everything that brought us to this point still happened the same way. Which means that you didn’t tell her shit and you didn’t do shit yourself.”

“The timeline--”

“Don’t give me that bullshit. When you chose to change the past, when you chose to erase her life and make it into something that _you_ liked better for your own sake, you changed the timeline. You don’t get to pick and choose that shit Steve, either play God or get the fuck out. If you’re going to interfere, then fucking _interfere_ , or don’t do anything at all.

“SHIELD wasn’t just where she worked, it was her creation, her passion, she led that organization until she was physically incapable of it. I don’t have to like her to acknowledge that if she had known about HYDRA’s continued existence – that they were inside of her own organization, that they were using what she built to grow and continue what we were trying to stop – she would have _done something_. Would have fought to stop them. That you could ignore that, that you could ignore me...”

“...”

“Did it occur to you at all? When you knew that Zola was at SHIELD, when December of 1991 came around…

“You claim to care about me. For someone that’s supposed to care about me to go back to the past and change it to suit themselves, yet knowingly and willingly abandon me to that kind of torture and suffering. All of those people that I was made to kill… I can’t believe that you would do that to me. To either of us. Whoever you are, you’re not Steve Rogers. And I want you to leave.”

**Author's Note:**

> And another quote! Because I decided to watch Doctor Who to help me with Endgame!feelings and found this exchange to be relevant...
> 
> “Have you got family?”  
> “No. Lost them a long time ago.”  
> “How’d you cope with that?”  
> “I carry them with me. What they would have thought and said and done. Make them a part of who I am. So even though they’re gone from the world, they’re never gone from me.”  
> \- Yasmin Khan, Ryan Sinclair, and The Doctor.  
> Doctor Who S11E01 – The Woman Who Fell to Earth
> 
> If you don’t follow Doctor Who, The Doctor is a 1000 year old alien time traveler. They have loved and lost so many people, and as a time traveler they could do something about it. They could change it. And yet, they don’t.


End file.
